Batman (20th Anniversary Edition) Blu-ray Review

The caped crusader gets his due in this standalone release of Tim Burton's original 1989 blockbuster.

Up until 1989, the character of Batman was most associated with the campy comic-book inspired television version (spun off to an even sillier feature film) starring Adam West as the caped crusader. But it was Burton who first replaced the tights and briefs with solid black body armor, dispensed with the youngster sidekick and raised the stakes with an insane, homicidal nemesis in the dark and highly stylized film known simply as Batman.

Batman, starring Michael Keaton as the billionaire heir turned masked nighttime avenger and Jack Nicholson as the Joker, is still a sight to behold, a heady blend of atmosphere and pop storytelling. If Richard Donner's Superman laid the groundwork for comic properties being taken seriously as big-budget, summer-event tent poles, Batman certainly reinforced that notion, delivering a rousing example of the storytelling possibilities that still exist in such heightened worlds. And while there was an undeniable drop-off in terms of quality as the series progressed, Batman still holds up as the film that reinvented and reignited the superhero genre as a major theatrical event.

Casting Keaton as Bruce Wayne may not have been the most obvious choice back then, but he does imbue the character with a certain fidgety charisma that hints at a complicated internal life behind those expressive eyes. Despite the trappings of wealth and privilege, he seems like a regular, affable guy, but that's kind of the point. If he were already a scary or threatening presence, he wouldn't have to dress up in a bat suit. It's just too bad that they couldn't figure out a way to build the suit so that he could move his neck (a problem which still plagues costume designers to this day).

It almost goes without saying, thought, that the real star of the film is Nicholson. He cackles, he mugs, he dances like a loon and turns his performance on a dime, going from buffoonish clown to psychopathic killer and back again in a matter of seconds. He gets the best and most memorable lines, too – who can forget his classic delivery of dialogue like "Wait'll they get a load of me" and "Where does he get those wonderful toys?" Batman would be nothing without the Joker, and this film makes that connection even more explicit, changing the comic-book origin to make a young Jack Napier (who would later become the Joker) the one who killed Bruce's parents.

The extravagant sets and distinctive production design are pure Burton. Gotham City features a fusion of gothic, art deco and industrial styles, with a timeless feel (the gangsters wear suits and hats right out of a James Cagney film). Dark is the watchword here, with plenty of blacks and grey tones, even the Joker, the loudest character in the film – both in terms of fashion and in volume – sticks to the deep jewel tones of emerald and amethyst. It's a far cry from the bright, primary colors of the previous incarnation.

Batman has been through a number of incarnations, both representing highs and lows in the history of the franchise. This is one of the high points, and is worth revisiting in light of the current resurgence of the character, thanks to the likes of Christopher Nolan and Christian Bale. The latest incarnations owe much to Burton's legacy, and it could be argued that they couldn't have existed had this one not come first and set a new, more serious tone for the big-screen Batman of the new millennium.

Score: 8 out of 10

Video and Presentation

This is the same 1080p version of the film that was included with the Blu-ray Anthology set released back in March. The first glimpse is not promising, as the opening credits seem to have been left out of the remastering process. The initial picture is speckled with dust and unstable, but it does give you a good sense of how much work was done to improve it when the movie actually starts and looks relatively clean by comparison. Burton's first installment is darker and not quite as oversaturated as the subsequent films in the franchise, and this presentation stays true to that palette with only some slight color degradation. There's a distinct improvement in the level of detail over past releases, too, but at times the picture suffers from a soft haziness, likely the result of the digital smoothing process. The visual effects don't always hold up so well, either, and look nearly cartoonish at times. Still, taking into account the fact that the film is two decades old now, it looks pretty good for its age.

Score: 8 out of 10

Languages and Audio

This disc has an improved 5.1 Dolby TrueHD mix in English, along with a standard 5.1 track in English and stereo tracks in an impressive range of languages (the standard Spanish and French, plus German and Portuguese). Unfortunately, there's only so much that can be done with the limited, 20-year-old original source material. The sounds of bullets and ricochets come across as a little distorted and hollow, and the moments where the base should really kick in (like in the scene with the exploding chemical plant) leave you wanting a little more firepower, especially from the LFE channel. On the plus side, Danny Elfman's often riotous score is well balanced and fills the entire sound field when it's in full force. The moments of stereoscopic movement are most effective during the action scenes, but it doesn't make up for a rather flat-sounding presentation.